During Thursday's Texas-TCU matchup, ESPN college football analyst Jesse Palmer demonstrated what Texas' hook 'em horns hand signal looks like when turned upside down, something Mack Brown went onto a tirade about disliking a couple of weeks ago. Palmer would apologize for the gesture later in the game, stating that he meant no disrespect. Of course, no one actually thought Palmer was being disrespectful with his demonstration of the hand signal, but he had to offer this forced apology anyways, via Outkick the Coverage.

This is typical ESPN damage control. In a world where Stephen A. Smith can go unpunished for this, Palmer was forced to apologize for… a non-profane hand signal? What is that? Out of all the unnecessary apologies on ESPN airwaves in the past year, this is certainly the most unnecessary.

I guess this is what happens when your parent network (ESPN in this case) is in bed with the school that you dare to even hint at offending with something as innocuous an upside down hand signal (Texas). Avid college football watchers are just waiting for signs of ESPN's favortism towards Texas and they got a big one with this laughable episode.